Blood Brothers

Brotherhood, the high octane Showtime family drama of Irish gangsters, politicians, blood and betrayal, set in the back streets and boardrooms of Providence, has returned to the airwaves. If you've been missing The Sopranos, this is definitely the best way to get a mob drama fix. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to the show's creator, writer and executive producer Blake Masters about the new season.

BROTHERHOOD, the Irish American crime drama now in its breakout second season on Showtime, is all about the inevitable contradiction of the American Dream.

It's about how the quest for power to do good can end up being polluted by the desire for power. No wonder it makes such compulsive viewing.

"It's a classical American theme. It's about how you achieve power, and then that power corrupts you," the show's creator Blake Masters told the Irish Voice during a recent interview.

"There are several prominent politicians I can think of in New England where one brother had a career in state politics and was very prominent while his brother spent multiple times in jail. So it's not an unheard of thing. I found the dynamic fascinating: what do you do when the brother that you love is also the impediment keeping you from the thing that you most want in the world - keeping you from your ambition?"

It's an unsolvable conundrum, which is why it supplies the juiciest types of drama, because there's no ultimate right and wrong, or at least not immediately.

Asked if he was thinking of the true life experiences of the notorious Boston gangster Whitey Bulger and his prominent politician brother William, Masters demurs. "I knew the story of Senator Bulger and his brother William, but there's actually another example I found out about and based my research on. It was a story I found equally compelling."

The critically acclaimed Irish mobster show coasted toward an explosive finale last season, leaving millions of viewers on the edge of their seats with many unanswered questions about the fate of the Caffee family. Season one of this unusually intense blue-collar crime drama set in Providence, Rhode Island created a witch's brew of family, crime, politics and morality that has made it both a critical darling and a public success.

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Nster.com